Trip to the Getty Museum

Today, I took a trip to the Getty Museum with my son-in-law, Chris, my granddaughter, Naomi (although today, she informed us, her name was Cherry because she was wearing a red dress), and Chris's parents who are visiting. The top picture is the Getty museum from down the hill. The second picture is of some of the museum buildings in a reflective window. Third is Chris and Naomi (Cherry) in the museum cafeteria, and at the bottom is Chris's mom along with Chris and Naomi in the museum garden.

Kidspace in Pasadena

The top picture is of me and Naomi on the artificial snow that they made at Kidspace so that southern California kids could experience snow. The next two pictures are of my daughter, Kathy with Naomi, and the last picture is of Naomi with her friend Zachary.

Lunch with the Angels

Lunch with Carmen and Bob Angel, Chris's parents.

Visting

Visiting Kathy's roommate from college at her aunt and Uncle's house.

At the Pirate Show Dinner Theater

Top -- Kathy and Miriam at the Pirate Show
Middle -- The Pirate Show stage
Bottom -- Naomi and Mason at the Pirate Show

Lunch after Yoga class 12/19/09

My daughter, Kathy, feeding her daughter, Naomi, after yoga class.

Los Angeles

Farmers Market Los Angeles. The top picture is of my older daughter, Kathy with her daughter, Naomi. My brother, Kenny, is in the background looking at something else.

The next picture shows me with Naomi.

Then, we see Adria Imada, Kathy's roommate from college, with her daughter, Naia. Adria is now a professor at UC Irvine teaching American Studies with an emphasis on the pacific islands. Adria is from Hawaii.

The bottom picture shows Adria photographing Naomi, Naia, and Stephanie Christensen. Stephanie was Kathy's study partner in law school. They'd often commute to school on Stephanie's motorcycle. Now that Steph is a lawyer, and a federal prosecutor, she's stepped up to a motor vehicle with more wheels, but with just as much elan (whatever elan is). Now she rides around in a red 1966 Mustang.

Patton Memorial Museum

General Patton Memorial Museum
62-510 Chiriaco Road, Chiriaco Summit, CA 92201

Titan Missle Museum

This is the last Titan Missle. It was part of the US, mutually assured destruction strategy to prevent the USSR from launching a first nuclear strike. This sort of thing only works if the enemy knows how good your ability to respond to a first strike really is so the US, while nominally acting like it was keeping the details a secret, let the Russian spies get the information about how our system worked. Even though the Russians had many more ICBMs than we did, and hugely more powerful nuclear weapons, they knew from their spies that we had enough clout to destroy them even if they did strike first.

The second picture is a re-entry vehicle that would house a thermonuclear weapon. The third picture is an entire Titan missle inside the last remaining Titan silo. It's been rendered inoperable according to the terms of the nuclear disarmament treaty, and any Russian can come here to take the tour to see that it's inoperable because the extremely heavy silo cover has been cemented stuck in the half open position. The last picture is the control room. That's where they'd have launched the missle from if they'd ever gotten the launch order from the President.

This museum is around 15 miles south of Tucson, AZ.

Dinner in Tucson

We had dinner in Tucson at the Pinnacle Peak Steak House. Kenny remembered it as the place with the best steak he's ever eaten. It's still like that. The top two pictures show their decor. They have cowboy art and neckties. I didn't see it happen, but Kenny tells me that the neckties come from their customers. Whenever a customer comes to dinner wearing a necktie, someone from the restaurant comes by and cuts it off. Then they hang up the necktie with a little card with the name of the customer. Apparently, men come in wearing neckties knowing what's going to happen. Nobody came in with a necktie while we were there. A group of men came in dressed up in nice suits, but none of them were wearing ties.

The second picture from the bottom is my steak. It was delicious. The bottom picture is the lady who was our server. She gave me permission to post her picture on my blog,

White Sands National Monument is a desert ecosystem dominated by sands made of gypsum rather than the silica that makes up normal sand. There's just enough water in the environment to support specially adapted plants and animals, but not so much water that the sand, which is soluble in water, gets dissolved and washed away.

Carlsbad Caverns

Carlsbad Caverns National Park is in southern New Mexico. It was one of my travel destinations because they have a cafeteria over 700 feet below the ground. They started having the cafeteria way back when the only way to get down there, and back up again, was to walk. People had to fortify themselves with some food and fluid for the trip back up to the surface. Human beings had to cart the food down there, and had to cart the waste up. Once the government put in elevators, the Park Service wanted to remove the cafeteria since it wasn't a natural part of the cave environment, and it was no longer needed by the patrons. They still want to discontinue it, but lots of people have objected to their congress persons, and so far, the cafeteria is still there. The top picture is of me and my brother having a snack in the cafeteria. I wanted to experience the cave, but I also wanted to experience the cafeteria, and now I have.

Kenny and I are spending the night in Alamogordo, NM

Pecos Texas

This morning, we visited the West of the Pecos Museum in Pecos, TX. The top two pictures have my brother in them.